Swansea Vets 7 Penarth Vets 1

AN unfortunate rash of late withdrawals left Penarth Hockey Club’s veterans side up against it as they travelled west for a spring fixture with Swansea.

Despite having started the summer hockey season with a tough loss at home to familiar foes Whitchurch, Penarth refused to take an easy route towards restoring their pride, with a trip to Swansea pitching them against one of the best veterans’ sides in the region.

The Bears’ task was not made any simpler as a number of players were forced to pull out of the squad late in the week, leaving a bare 11 to take on a younger and more practiced Swansea team at King George V playing fields.

With the majority of the absentees coming from the defence, goalkeeper Jason Harris faced a busy time between the sticks from the very start of the morning encounter, and the home side duly wasted little time in opening the scoring. As Penarth struggled to clear their lines, particularly on secondary balls and rebounds, Swansea kept the pressure in the visitors’ half, gradually increasing the score to 4-0 by the interval, despite the best efforts of captain Nick Pratt and fellow defenders Graeme Jones and Ian Smith.

Unable to make any significant changes to the line-up, Penarth resolved to tidy up their game in the second half, and the performance was indeed improved, with black-and-blue midfield general Rob Harrison instrumental in creating more attacking opportunities to add to a couple of first half penalty corner chances.

Unfortunately for the Vale side, Swansea struck against the early run of play to extend their advantage to five goals before Penarth finally made their efforts count as Craig Llewellyn crashed home a world class penalty corner strike.

Llewellyn was denied a second goal when a corner deflected into the roof of the net by the home goalkeeper was deemed to have been travelling too high to have struck the backboard, and a series of eccentric umpiring decisions subsequently combined to frustrate both sides in what was an otherwise friendly encounter.

Despite the bonhomie, however, Swansea weren’t about to show any mercy to their opponents and added a couple of late goals to take the final score to 7-1.

With no league fixtures until the resumption of hostilities in September, Penarth will continue to focus on its Veterans XI throughout the summer, building up to the inauguration of its new home pitch at Stanwell School later in the year. A return fixture against Whitchurch gives the Vale side an immediate chance to restore some honour before it makes a number of tournament appearances in the coming months.

Penarth Hockey Club always welcomes new, old and returning players, umpires, supporters, friends and helpers regardless of age and ability. Training takes place on the artificial turf at Barry Sport Centre every Wednesday, with the Juniors in action between 6-7pm and Senior between 7-8pm.

Further information can be obtained from club secretary Dave Stevens at d_stevens81@hotmail.co.uk.